


you're the gin inside my tonic

by pierrot



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 16:43:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11948376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pierrot/pseuds/pierrot
Summary: Drinking to the point of forgetting isn't ideal when it leads to waking up in a strange bed.





	you're the gin inside my tonic

**Author's Note:**

> HBD Jun! I like you a lot and I'm glad to know you. Sorry for all the weird fic I write with you as the star, but it comes from a place of great affection. I hope to still be around for your 35th! :)
> 
> This is a messy, humble offering in place of all the WIPs I hoped I might finish for today and obviously didn't. Apologies for any mistakes I didn't manage to pick up before posting (I'm sure there are some).

Waking up in an unfamiliar bed is never one of Jun’s favourite experiences. For starters, there’s always the moment of horrible fear after realising that the pillow he’s clutching is not his own, and before he manages to find his phone, when he doesn’t know what time it is or if he’s already late for a schedule he can’t quite recall in his sleepy state.  
  
He discovers his phone on the bare bedside table beside him and all is well. It’s just past seven in the morning, and now his brain is functioning a little better, he remembers he has nothing planned for the day.  
  
That’s why he was able to stay out so late last night. Drinking until the early hours of the morning always seems like a good idea when there are no real consequences to face the next day--save for the inevitable hangover.  
  
His hangover is another reason to regret finding himself in a strange bedroom. If Jun was at his own apartment, or even Shun’s, he could roll back over and try to sleep away the worst of the queasy after-effects currently causing his stomach to lurch and his temples to pound. Now, he has to haul himself up and do his best to prepare for an awkward conversation with whoever he finds on the other side of the door.  
  
Looking around offers him no real clues to where exactly he’s ended up. The room is oddly bare and impersonal--it’s a spare room, he supposes. Though not the spare room at Shun’s place. Shun’s place he knows well.  
  
There’s no sign of an ensuite, either, so Jun has no choice but to make his way outside. His mouth tastes filthy. He needs to pee. He also needs to shower, but perhaps not as urgently as he would if he woke up naked. He’s still wearing the exact same outfit he had on the night before, sans his jacket, and he’ll have to remember to look for it before he leaves.  
  
He runs a hand through his hair as he heads for the door, hoping he looks slightly better than he feels, and shrugs some of the stiffness out of his shoulders before stepping outside.  
  
As soon as he does, he’s seized with the overwhelming desire to retreat.  
  
“Good morning,” Sho says, glancing up at Jun from the pages of the newspaper spread across his lap. “I wasn’t expecting you to be up this early.”  
  
He looks far more composed than Jun feels. Maybe that’s fair--he’s not the one who can’t remember last night--but surely this is not a situation for him to be sitting so calmly on his sofa, sipping coffee and reading newspapers.  
  
“I didn’t expect to find myself here,” Jun says.  
  
“Don’t you remember? Shun called me last night and I asked if I could take you off his hands. You were pretty determined about not wanting to go home.”  
  
Jun frowns. “Why did he call you?”  
  
The look Sho gives Jun is maddeningly inscrutable, eyebrows lifting a fraction as he tilts his head and says, “I don’t know.”  
  
Jun can’t tell whether he’s lying.  
  
“Do you want anything?” Sho says, folding the pages of his newspaper. “Coffee?”  
  
Jun’s bladder is quicker to respond than his brain. “Bathroom.”  
  
“To your right.” Sho nods his head in the direction of the bathroom and Jun follows the movement, grateful to be able to make a temporary escape.  
  
His respite doesn’t last long enough. When he returns, Sho has moved to the kitchen. Jun can hear the sound of a kettle boiling.  
  
“Tea or coffee?” Sho asks when their eyes meet.  
  
“Tea.” Jun likes tea. Drinking tea helps him think when his thoughts are muddled.  
  
His thoughts are definitely muddled right now.  
  
He takes a seat at Sho’s dining table and Sho is kind enough to bring the tea over to him, placing a full pot and a cup down on the table. Sho’s coffee disappeared in the time Jun was in the bathroom, but he still he still sits in the seat across from Jun while he pours his tea.  
  
Jun takes a first, slow sip, closing his eyes for a second as the steam warms his face. When he opens them again, Sho is staring at him strangely.  
  
“What?” he says.  
  
Sho doesn’t break eye contact. “So I’m guessing you’re going to tell me you don’t remember anything that happened last night?”  
  
“And?”  
  
Jun’s known Sho long enough to know how best to deal with him. He’s not going to be so easily embarrassed. (He’s _not_.)  
  
“You were a lot nicer last night, you know?” Sho’s smiling now, lips quirked as though amused by some private joke Jun doesn’t understand. “You kept apologising to me.”  
  
“Did I?”  
  
“You apologised, thanked me, and then you kept telling me I was 'actually a really good guy'. It seemed important to you for me to know you thought that.”  
  
Jun can’t imagine doing any such thing. He sets his cup down on the table and stares at his hands. “Is that all I said?”  
  
“Hmm, I wonder?”  
  
Jun looks up. “ _Sho_.”  
  
“Wait here for me a second,” Sho says, still smiling. “There’s something I need to get.”  
  
He leaves the table without another word uttered by Jun. A short while later, he returns holding a small bag that he passes over to Jun before taking his seat.  
  
“I’m sorry it’s not wrapped,” he says. “Happy Birthday.”  
  
Jun stills, fingers touching the bag. “You got me a present?”  
  
“Of course.”  
  
The bag Sho’s given him is plain and nondescript, but the red jewellery box is not. Jun can feel his pulse start to quicken as his fingers move to open the box, eyes tracing the familiar, gold letters printed on the top.  
  
Inside is a simple, thin cuff made of white gold. It’s beautiful.  
  
“I wasn’t going to give it to you,” Sho says. “Someone told me it was probably a little too much for a birthday present.”  
  
Jun traces his fingers around the band. “Why did you change your mind?”  
  
“Well, I bought it for you, and I wanted to give it to you. Felt like a waste to return it. Besides, don’t I always spoil you?”  
  
When Jun looks up, Sho is smiling that smile Jun so often sees on their variety shows, the one where Sho is half making fun of himself and half teasing Jun, but there’s something else in his eyes beyond a lighthearted joke. It’s something meaningful, and Jun thinks he might understand.  
  
Sho blinks, shifting back in his seat, and the moment is broken.  
  
“I actually need to get to get going,” Sho says, genuinely apologetic. “Here, have these.”  
  
He fishes something out from his pocket before placing it on the table. It’s a set of keys: one normal key and one fob.  
  
Jun frowns.  
  
“There’s a spare towel in the bathroom--the blue one. And a toothbrush, too, in the cabinet. You can have a shower, brush your teeth, whatever you need to do, and then lock up when you leave. I’ll get the keys from you later.”  
  
“Sho, I can’t--”  
  
“You can. Or are you telling me you don’t want to shower right now?”  
  
Jun blinks. He does. He really does, and he wants to do something about the slimy feeling in his mouth, and travelling from Sho’s apartment back to his own requires a bit of planning if he’s going to avoid detection.  
  
“That’s settled, then,” Sho says. He’s on his feet before Jun can think of something to say. “If you want to borrow anything to wear, or cook yourself something to eat, go ahead. I don’t mind.”  
  
“You’re sure?”  
  
“I’m sure.”  
  
Sho lingers for a second, as though he wants to add something else, and Jun waits, but all Sho says, “I’ll see you later,” with a nod and another smile. He turns around and heads for the door, and soon enough, Jun is all alone in Sho’s apartment.  
  
It’s a position in which he never expected to find himself.  
  
Feeling very strange, Jun decides to abandon his half-finished tea. The sooner he leaves, the better, he thinks. Maybe he’ll forgo the shower and just brush his teeth. That’ll have to be enough to make him feel somewhat human again.  
  
A spare toothbrush is easily found in the bathroom cabinet, just as Sho said, still in its packaging. Jun quickly washes his face and sets to scrubbing his mouth clean of the filthy taste coating his tongue.  
  
Before he can finish, he’s interrupted by a knock on the front door.  
  
For a moment, he wonders if he should just ignore it. Surely Sho wouldn’t want any visitors to know Jun is here, and Jun doesn’t want that either. But then the knock is repeated with an accompanying, muffled shout from a voice he knows is Sho’s. Jun spits the remaining toothpaste in his mouth into the basin and sloppily wipes his mouth with the back of his hand before moving back through Sho’s apartment.  
  
“I forgot something,” Sho says when Jun opens the door.  
  
“What?”  
  
“This.”  
  
Even before Sho moves, Jun knows what he’s about to do. There’s more than enough time for Jun to move away or interrupt if he wants.  
  
He doesn’t move. He stays perfectly still save for his eyelids falling shut as Sho reaches to cup the side of his face and press their lips together, short and soft and with a surprising spark that jolts through Jun at the brief contact.  
  
He’s not given nearly enough time to taste or feel or think about what’s happening. Sho’s already pulled away with a smile that’s equal parts nervous and pleased.  
  
“Happy Birthday, Jun,” Sho says. “Sorry I couldn’t give you your present on the actual day.”  
  
Jun blinks. “Did you purposely wait to do that until after I brushed my teeth?”  
  
The corners of Sho’s mouth spread wider across his face. “You can get mad at me later if you want, okay? I wasn’t lying before--I really have to get going.”  
  
His hand slips away from Jun’s face, and Jun almost reaches to stop it. “Wait,” he says just as Sho’s about to turn around. “What time do you finish work?”  
  
Sho glances back at him. “Uh… I should be done around seven-thirty, I think.”  
  
“Do you want to have dinner after? I’ll cook.”  
  
“You’ll… cook?”  
  
“Unless your kitchen is just for show and you don’t actually own any pans.”  
  
Sho’s eyes widen. “No, I--I own pans. Good pans.” He beams at Jun, face positively glowing with happiness, and Jun thinks the sight might be an undiscovered cure for hangovers. “Dinner sounds great. I’ll call you when I know what time I’ll be back?”  
  
Jun nods. “I’ll be waiting.”  
  
Maybe waking up in an unfamiliar bed isn’t such a terrible thing after all, Jun thinks after Sho has left and he’s back inside the apartment. He touches his fingers absent-mindedly to his lips and smiles. Maybe he could even repeat the experience tomorrow.  
  
He thinks he would like that.


End file.
